The idea was this: bring together two local bands who are putting out their second major label albums for a discussion of life in the music business -- making records, constant touring, radio, press, and the Chicago music world. Although the proximity of the bands' sophomore releases certainly played into it, our primary interest in having the Smoking Popes and Fig Dish get together was to see who would win in an Olympic-regulation Greco-Roman wrestling match. Secondarily, we wanted to hear what they'd learned and experienced during their first foray into major label-dom. Both bands were signed during the Chicago-as-"Cutting Edge's New Capitol"-flurry a few years back, and unlike many of their local compatriots (Tripl3fastaction, Wicker Man, The Lupins), Fig Dish and the Smoking Popes have survived to put out a second record.
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Listening to Fig Dish's new album, When Shove Goes Back to Push (Polydor), you may notice that the soaring, power-pop music sometimes doesn't quite jibe with the sleepy, alcohol-infused slack of the lyrics. But according to guitarist Blake Smith, there's a good reason for the disparity. "We made (Shove) in Philadelphia in the dead of winter. The sun comes up for about 18 minutes a day; the rest of the day its pitch black and there's nothing to do except drink Yuengling beer and eat lots of Philadelphia cheese steaks." So it's diet-related? "If you want to blame the general malaise, the lingering sense of ennui (on Shove) on the un-success of our first record, you could also do that," Smith admits. "It was kind of disappointing to us. I think any band that gets signed to a major label and makes a first record is kind of -- whether they want to admit or not -- expecting to become stars. I thought Love Songs was a really great record, and we toured forever for that first record. The label pulled the plug on it but forgot to tell us." "Four months later," adds guitarist Rick Ness, "in the dead of winter, we're in Kentucky playing a club for two people. You have to re-evaluate your situation." Fig Dish did just that. Although the newly invigorated riffage you hear bursting from Shove didn't develop until some good old-fashioned self-pity was purged. "We came off the Gin Blossoms (tour) and went to Andy Gerber's studio up in Rogers Park and basically wrote 12 songs right away," Smith continues. "It was coming off the legendary van crash where we destroyed all our equipment and almost died. We kinda did the 'we crashed our van, our record is over with, we're so bumming, woe is us' record. (We) mailed it off to the label and they were like, 'Yeah, right. Write us some friggin' pop songs you losers." Which they did. After parting ways with original drummer Andrew Hamilton, who was replaced by Shove's drummer of record Bill Swartz (who has since been replaced by basher Brian Nolan), the band got busy. And kinda happy. Shove's first five songs draw the listener in with hook after hook: "Come On (Don't Come On)" pulses with thick, clear guitar riffs designed for open-road blasting. "When Shirts Get Tight" leans on some retro sing-along "ooh-oohs," and "Pretty Never Hurts" features a sly lyric and a memorable chorus. Fig Dish's Cheap Trick soul breaks through on bassist Mike Willison's first offering "Dare You to Vanish." Ness' "Bend" -- one of the album's best cuts -- squawks with guitar and a sluggish, compelling melody, and "Sleep Startles" is pumped with early Who energy. The wide-open, brash pop quality running through much of Shove is reminiscent of another Chicago act's finest record to date: Urge Overkill's Saturation. "We all think Saturation is a totally kick-ass record," enthuses Smith, which is why they wanted Joe Nicolo (half of the famed Butcher Brothers) to produce Shove. As he did with Saturation, Nicolo gave Shove something of a glowing pwower-pop injection. "We got better at getting sounds, technically, in the studio," explains Ness. "We were a lot like Steely Dan in the studio this time around. Really anal." But still, it comes down to writing better songs, which is what puts Fig Dish at least a high forehead above today's guitar-rock pack. "The songwriting on (Shove) is way way better," says Smith. "It's more melodic, it's more of a classic pop sense. When we were making the first record, we were listening to a lot of indie rock -- like Seam and Hum -- and with this record, personally, I was listening to a lot of The Kinks, The Byrds, En Vogue." "The Spice Girls album came out when we were doing a lot of the record," notes Willison, "so we were listening to that pretty heavily." Smith: "Rick was Passed Out Spice, I was Wobbly Spice, Mike was Two Table Spice." If you hadn't figured it out yet, Fig Dish doesn't take much of the rock 'n' roll trappings very seriously. A healthy dose of wit and skepticism is integral to Fig Dish's rock life. "American rock is humorless," says Ness. "I think our record's fun," Smith continues. "Most of my songs are about partying. Seriously. Look -- I'm indoors and I'm wearing sunglasses, man. Who's the partyer?" "I think we're finally making the music we wish other bands would get off their asses and make. Super up-beat, melodic, but hard pop. Like a Cheap Trick record. Something that's fun and makes you want to crank while you're driving really fast. "The last four years have been unbelievably fun and we've gotten to live a life that I've fantasized about since I was about nine years old. Instead of acting like this is miserable, this is such a bummer to travel all over the country, sign autographs, meet famous people, get paid for it -- this is great! And we got tired of acting like it wasn't. The whole self-deprecating thing is so 1994, man. We're in a new age of positivity. We're all toting crystals. Our planets are all aligned. We've all had colonics. We've embraced it."
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The Smoking Popes formed in 1990 in Crystal Lake, playing lots of all-ages punk shows and building a strong surburban fan base. They released their first album Get Fired in 1993 on local label Johann's Face and followed that up with the impressive Born To Quit in 1995. Before the year was out, Capitol Records had reissued the album and the Popes found success at radio with "Need You Around."
Though that single brought the Popes some initial notice (as well as some soundtrack slots), nothing else from the album really fired at radio. So after lots of touring behind Born To Quit, the band settled in to record the follow-up, Destination Failure, with noted pop-punk producer Jerry Finn (Green Day, Jawbreaker), releasing it at the end of August.
Fig Dish also formed at the start of the decade and began playing shows primarily in the city (which, as any young band will attest, means shitty slots). After releasing a couple of singles and a long-lost CD, the band caught the attention of Polygram subsidiary Atlas Records; they released the Lou Giordano (Husker Du) produced That's What Love Songs Often Do in 1995. Despite overwhelmingly good reviews and loads of touring with the likes of The Muffs, Veruca Salt, and the Gin Blossoms, Love Songs wasn't selling. When the band crashed its van on I-80 in Nebraska, it seemed time to cut bait on their debut album.
Spending last winter in Studio 4 with Butcher Brother Joe Nicolo, the band refocused, retooled, and recorded a much stronger batch of songs than their first go around. When Shove Goes Back To Push hit stores early in August.
The following is an edited transcript of the hour-plus conversation with both bands. This was the first-ever meeting of the two acts; after some initial awkwardness, and though it took awhile to get beyond some of the nervous patter -- imagine sitting two gangs down together and trying to get them to talk about vulnerability -- the bands got into the spirit of the interview.
Blake Smith (Fig Dish): I just want to say right off the bat that you guys don't look like a rock band. You look very healthy. What's up with that? (Laughter)
Josh Caterer (Smoking Popes): We've been resting. I'm pregnant.
Illinois Entertainer: What's the biggest myth you guys had to deal with in signing to a major label?
Mike Willison (Fig Dish): Autonomy.
Rick Ness (Fig Dish): That rock is fun.
Josh: I thought it was going to be way more fun. Before we signed, we'd only really played locally. We'd gone on like one week tours in our station wagons and stuff, but we signed and it was like, 'O.K. Gone for three months.' And that was no fun.
Smith: Did you guys have a whole road crew or were you dragging your own stuff around?
Josh: We took two guys with us -- a tour manager and a sound guy.
Smith: But you weren't on a bus?
Josh: No.
Smith: We're still not. We're still in the van. And everyone's like, 'Oh, it must be so great.' We just got back from touring with Veruca Salt and Local H, and they play their last song and they're like, "Thank you Providence," drop the guitar, and they're off stage and [they] start partying. We're like, "Thank you, good night," and then we have to band over and unplug. [Laughter] You go off, and then come back out and grab your amp. The crowd's like, "Wooo."
Josh: "By the way: can we stay at somebody's house tonight?"
Smith: You guys have any good games you play in the van?
Eli Caterer (Smoking Popes): The silent thing.
Josh: Yeah. The silent treatment game.
Smith: Is [touring] tough being brothers?
Josh: We'd already been through the hating each other thing.
Smith: Which brother kicks the most ass?
Eli: I'm the punisher. I'm the youngest and I'm the biggest. I'm The Enforcer.
Illinois Entertainer: Mike, you said you thought autonomy was the biggest myth.
Willison: When you sign to make records the label's like, "We'll be behind whatever you guys want to do." And then you give them your demo -- "This is what we got" -- and they're like [raised eyebrows].
Illinois Entertainer: What did you do differently in recording your new albums?
Josh: When we recorded the first one, we were on Johann's Face, so we recorded it and paid for it ourselves. We recorded it in about three days, so we didn't have time to really do another take. So recording [Destination Failure] with a guy [Jerry Finn] who would tell us to do it again ... I don't know.
Smith: It doesn't sound like someone came in and tinkered with you guys. I think the songwriting's a lot tighter [on the new record] -- if you don't mind somebody else from a crappy local band telling you that -- but the overall sound is really similar.
Eli: Yeah, it was pretty much the same thing. [Finn's] big thing was guitar tuners.
Josh: Jerry Finn's favorite phrase while we were recording this was, "I think that undermines the entire song." Like if I was to do a solo that was kind of atonal, he'd say, "I think the solo undermines the entire song. I used to like this song but now I think it sucks because of that solo."
Smith: I was listening to Destination Failure yesterday and you guys have a very classic, um -- not to compare you to another band, but I'm going to -- like The Muffs, you're essentially a punk band with very classic, mid-'60s pop melodies. What other things are you guys influenced by that most people wouldn't suspect?
Josh: A lot of Anne Murray.
Eli: Phoebe Snow.
Josh: The Amazing Rhythm Aces.
Smith: Are The Smiths any kind of influence on you guys?
Josh: Probably. It's not a conscious thing, but I did spend many hours listening to Louder Than Bombs over and over again when I was 14. Staring up at my Smiths poster.
Smith: Are you vegetarian then?
Josh: No. In fact, I don't eat anything that doesn't have meat in it.
Willison: Which makes touring easy. You can go anywhere and eat whatever you want.
Smith: Try and not eat meat on tour.
Willison: On the Ohio turnpike.
Smith: Through the entire state of Ohio, every 20 miles there's just a cow with a hatchet sticking out of its side. Serve yourself.
Josh: My question for you guys would be do you like Jawbreaker?
Smith: Yeah, definitely. We listen to Jawbreaker. I've heard that before. It's just super straight, 4/4 ... we're not totally different from you guys. We both jam The Buzzcocks, like melodies, [are] deeply influenced by Korn and Tool.
Illinois Entertainer: With these second albums coming out, is this what you expected, what you thought najor label life would be like?
Josh: If someone told me then that I would be sitting in a room with Fig Dish, I would never have signed that document.
Willison: When we first signed, we obviously wanted to be Kiss -- sell a hundred million records and become huge. But deep down we knew -- or at least hoped -- that we'd sell 30,000 records, and then on our next record we'd maybe sell 100,000, and then get another one and sell 200,000.
Illinois Entertainer: So fairly level-headed expectations?
Willison: Yeah. And then when that actually kinda happened on our first record, we were like, "This sucks. Where's our personal tour bus with the air-brushed arab on the side?"
Smith: You guys were from the punk scene, and it's super not cool to sell records if you're punk. Were people crying "sell out" when you signed to Capitol?
Josh: People were giving us a hard time even when we were playing in basements. Because we were too wimpy for them. Our big thing was we just didn't want to have to have regular jobs. And we wanted to be able to tour and financially survive from one show to another. Doing that on [Johann's Face] just wasn't working.
Smith: What kinds of jobs were you guys working?
Josh: I worked at an injection molding factory as a machine operator.
Smith: We just hid out in college. Just keep going to school until you get a record deal.
Willison: But then when you get signed you blow all your advance on your student loans. Then you have to get a job.
Smith: We signed a pretty standard deal, and when you see the actual numbers going around, I was like, "Shit -- we're going to be rich." But by the time everyone takes their cut, and you pay taxes, you get like $7.42. Did you guys find some of that?
Eli: We all had enough money when it was split up to go to the Super Bar at Wendy's.
Illinois Entertainer: I want to ask you guys about the flurry of label activity that went on here in '94 and '95.
Willison: Nothing ever happened. A bunch of people wrote about it, some bands got signed, but it wasn't like a huge scene. It was just that more people that you already knew were signed.
Illinois Entertainer: More than had been signed in this town in decades.
Josh: It was just a hype thing that had to do with looking for a new place to hype.
Ness: Seattle was exhausted.
Josh: And now it's like Lawrence, Kansas, or something like that. "The new Chicago."
Illinois Entertainer: Would Smoking Popes or Fig Dish be putting out records on a major label if that "scene" didn't happen?
Josh: We would be doing it on an indie label.
Smith: Same here. We were on an indie label in San Diego [Liquid Meat] and we'd probably still be there.
Illinois Entertainer: So you don't think it had any impact?
Smith: It did send A&R people to Chicago. And then two weeks later it was like, "Hey Wes [Kidd, Tripl3fastaction], did you guys get signed?" "Yeah, we got a deal." Call up [Local H's] Scott Lucas, "Yeah, we got one too." Call up Joel from Menthol. "Yeah, we got signed." All that in like four days.
Willison: It was like calling the day after Christmas to see what everybody got.
Smith: It was pretty exciting. I remember there was about a six month period where every time we played there was just an excitement to each show.
Josh: It kind of freaked me out because it was a different kind of excitement. We'd been playing around for like four years before we got signed, and we had pretty exciting shows just starting out in the suburbs, but it always seemed very natural. Like there was just a lot of excited people at the show. But then with all this stuff that was going on in the city, all these industry people in town, the excitement turned into a much creepier kind of excitement.
Willison: There was a lot of anxiety too because you'd play shows and it wouldn't just be your friends and family. You look up and there'd be a guy in a suit smoking a cigar.
Smith: Guys shaking your hand at Lounge Ax with leather gloves on. It's like, "What the fuck?"
Willison: It made you feel like if you try to have too much fun, or if you hit a bad note or you have to stop a song because your strings broke, that everyone would leave and you'd get buried.
Illinois Entertainer: Do you remember when you actually realized that the music business had little to do with the music?
Eli: I was scared. I cried myself to sleep. [Laughter] No. But I was upset about it for awhile. But there's still some good people in the music business. You just have to go with that. I already sold my soul.
Josh: People in the industry don't actually give a fuck about the music. I had a bunch of small realizations of that along the way. I was under the impression talking to the people at the label, that we were getting signed because they thought we just ruled. [Laughter] I'm sure that every band that gets signed has the same thing. Somebody said to them, "Your songwriting is the shit. Your music is going to be timeless, it's going to be fucking amazing." But then it come down to who gets on a cool movie soundtrack.
Willison: [Radio] guys don't give a shit what the song is at all. Or how bad or good it is. It's just, "If everyone else is doing it, then I've got to 'cause if I'm not doing it, then I look like an asshole."
Smith: The business of radio is so shady, just so bizarre and corrupt. It's Kafka-esque. Playlists are getting smaller and smaller. You've got four or five program directors in the entire United States that are going to decide whether you're going to have a shot to sell records. That's terrifying.
Illinois Entertainer: Do you guys feel that you at least have some kind of hometown advantage here in Chicago?
Willison: No. We've sold more records in Denver than we have in Chicago. Portland, Oregon -- we triple the sales that we do in Chicago. we're not on the radio, we never really had a huge following in Chicago.
Smith: I actually think you're at a disadvantage in Chicago if you're from Chicago. When you're touring, you always read the local press during soundcheck at clubs, and [you] realize that the press and radio actually support the local scene. When you go to Boston, you turn on the commercial radio stations and they're playing Boston bands that you'd never hear in the rest of the country. You come to Chicago and the press is ready to jump all over you and rip you to shreds. And you don't get any radio support here either.
Josh: Maybe it's because we got lucky with that "Need You Around" thing, but all the shows we've had at the Metro, except for the first one, have been really great. We've always felt like we have a hometown advantage when we play.
Smith: The club scene's great here; I was talking more about media.
Illinois Entertainer: What are your expectations -- realistic expectations -- for these second albums?
Josh: My goal is, no matter what happens, to remain as unaffected by it as I possibly can.
Illinois Entertainer: Why?
Josh: So that our music continues to be good. So that we can continue to make music even if we fail horribly. Or on the other hand, if by some fluke we become huge, that we still not let it affect what we're doing. It just doesn't mean anything.
Ness: It's really hard to have expectations. There's just too many bands. There are a lot of people out there that are into our kind of music, and I'd like to reach them. But it's a hard thing to do.
Willison: I just want to finish having a good time. If this is our last record, then let's get my ya-yas out right now. Let's say we get dropped or I have to find a job. I'm going to have to take my life a little more seriously, so may as well not do that now.
Eli: As long as we can keep enjoying playing together. Our destination is failure, so anything else that actually happens is cool.
Josh: Gonna give 110%. It's a real team effort. I think we're going to get out there and play a good set. We're gonna try to play defensively out there. [Laughter]
Smith: As much as we bitch about not being huge, we have a record deal and we don't have jobs, and everyone in this room is incredibly lucky to be doing it. I'm just going to make music as long as people will let me make music and get everything out of it that I can.
Oh -- and fuck off. I just love to end an interview with that.
